Another quilt finished!

I am so happy to have a functioning frame and machine again! I offered to quilt a t-shirt quilt for my best friend, Mary, at the shop, but I had a problem. I had a charity quilt loaded on the frame that needed to be quilted first. I had made a couple of passes on Sunday morning to make sure that the brain on the speed control was working properly and I was going to finish it up on Sunday evening when I got back from working at the shop.

I hit a snag. I woke up on Sunday with a bit of a tickle in my throat and chest. I sneezed quite a bit at work and, when I got home, I promptly fell asleep. I woke up around 7:30 congested. It was awful! Well, not really, but I didn't feel like dragging myself to the basement that night. So, I ate a little something, let the dogs out and went to bed.

Today, I didn't feel that awful and I got a good night's sleep last night so I planned to finish the charity quilt, load the t-shirt quilt and quilt it tonight. After all, my iPod is fully functioning again so I could listen to a book while FMQ'ing!

In the past, I have had some spatial issues with the frame and stippling. I would run out of room and end up with a long straight line that didn't fit with a stipple pattern. Since I want to do a stipple on the t-shirt quilt and I want to master this simple design, I tried something new.

I had seen a suggestion on the DVDs that I got with the frame on setting up and using the frame and machine. There was a tip to mark the quilt with something so that you would see how much room was left in the area where you are quilting. I thought it was a silly tip for someone who had no experience, but I filed it away in my head for a rainy day. Well, I remembered it while I was thinking about my issues with running out of room.

To finish this quilt, I got my roll of painter's tape and marked off the quilting area each time I advanced the quilt. I also didn't advance so far each time so that I could sort of overlap my rows so that it didn't look like each pass was separate. Now, I don't think that this quilt would win any awards, but I think it looks awesome! Some kid is going to love it!

Here is the finished charity quilt for the Guild.




Now, bring on the t-shirt quilt!